Sweeney Todd
Sweeney Todd, also known as Benjamin Barker, is the main character in the Broadway musical and the film it was based on. Story Sweeney Todd's real identity is actually Benjamin Barker, a barber falsely accused of a crime he didn't commit. He was sentenced for life in a prison in Australia, but managed to escape after 15 years. When Barker returns to London, he has decided to start over again, and returns with name Sweeney Todd so no one will recognize him by name. He heads to his old home, which is now owned by the lady Mrs. Lovett; an absent-minded person who has turned the first floor into a pie shop and restaurant whilst un-touching the second floor other than to hide Barker's shaving knives. Suspecting Sweeney Todd is Benjamin Barker, she tells him that his wife Lucy got raped by the evil judge Turpin, and that he has also taken his daughter Johanna as his own. When Sweeney cries out a horrified: "No!" (which reveals his real identity to Mrs. Lovett), she claims to know his wife's fate. Mrs. Lovett continues, and tells him that she poisoned herself many years ago with arsenic from the local pharmacy. After hearing her fate, Sweeney Todd understands it is judge Turpin who has ruined his life, and swears revenge upon him. Story versions In some versions of the Sweeney Todd story Mrs. Lovett, his partner in crime and variously his friend or lover (and whose first name is variously Nellie (the most common), Marjorie, Sarah, Shirley or Claudette), hides his crimes by butchering the corpses of Todd's victims, baking their flesh into meat pies, and selling them to unknowing customers. For reasons varying according to adaptation, Todd has lost his wife, Lucy Barker, and has been exiled for life; These misfortunes fuel a hatred for all mankind. Todd is also assisted by an unwitting apprentice named Tobias Ragg (A boy from a work house who had been travelling with Pirelli), who later aids in unmasking his crimes. In most recent versions of the story, Todd either helps or hinders (sometimes both) the love affair of a young woman, Johanna Barker, with a sailor named Mark Ingesterie (more commonly known as Anthony Hope). In the musical stage production and 2007 film, Johanna is Todd's daughter, Johanna Barker. The United States has announced that a new drama television program is currently in production to give the story of Sweeney Todd a new life from a new point of view. The story will feature each of the exsisting characters but with the twist of the tale being told from Mrs Lovett's point of view. FOX 8 believes that the story will be similar to the current show airing in both Australia and America, "The Good Wife" where it portrays a woman in her life behind a powerful known figure in the world. Production managers have stated that they also would like to rearange the story a little bit, claiming that what would happen if Mrs Lovett began to disagree with the actions she and Sweeney were taking. currentlly no title has been declared but the favoured options are "The Pie Woman" and "A Little Priest". The character of Sweeney would also be more reassuring to Mrs Lovett that what they were doing wasn't wrong, it was just. Dramatic and musical adaptations * The String of Pearls was adapted as a melodrama in 1847 by George Dibden Pitt and opened at Hoxton's Britannia Theatre, and billed as "founded on fact". It was something of a success, and the story spread by word of mouth and took on the quality of an urban legend. Various versions of the tale were staples of the British theatre for the rest of the century. * Circa 1865, a dramatic adaption called Sweeney Todd, the Barber of Fleet Street: or the String of Pearls written by Frederick Hazleton premiered at the Old Bower Saloon, Stangate Street, Lambeth.2 * In 1936 a film version of the Victorian melodrama was made, called Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street, starring Tod Slaughter in the title role. * "Sweeney Todd, the Barber" is a song that assumes its audience knows the stage version and claims that such a character in real life was even more remarkable, yet it contains most of the story portrayed in the theater and cinema. Stanley Holloway, who recorded it in 1956, attributed it to R. P. Weston, a songwriter active from 1906 to 1934. * An adaptation of the Sweeney Todd story was prominently featured in an episode of the radio drama The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes entitled "The Strange Case of the Demon Barber" on 8 January 1946. * In 1947, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's CBC Stage Series broadcast an over-the-top radio adaptation of the Pitt play starring Mavor Moore as "Sweeney Todd", Jane Mallett as "Mrs. Lovett", John Drainie as "Tobias", Lloyd Bochner as "Mark Ingesterie" and Arden Kaye as "Johanna Oakley". The production was adapted by Ronald Hamilton and directed by Andrew Allan, with original music composed by Lucio Agostini. * On 10 December 1959 the Royal Ballet premiered a ballet based on the story with music by Malcolm Arnold. Choreography was by John Cranko. * A version of Sweeney Todd's story is told in the 1970 horror film Bloodthirsty Butchers, directed by Andy Milligan. * In 1970, Freddie Jones starred as the title character in the episode "Sweeney Todd" on the ITV series Mystery and Imagination, an adaptation by Vincent Tilsey from the Pitt play that changed the character of Todd from a fiendish and gleeful murderer to a deluded madman; the production was directed by Reginald Collin. Heather Canning played "Mrs. Lovett", Lewis Fiander played "Mark Ingesterie", Mel Martin played the heroine "Charlotte" and Len Jones played "Tobias". * The 1973 CBC TV series The Purple Playhouse featured a production of Sweeney Todd, with Barry Morse (best known for his role as "Lt. Gerard" in The Fugitive) as Mr. Todd. This was again Pitt's version of the play. * The British playwright Christopher Bond wrote a 1973 play titled Sweeney Todd. This version of the story was the first to give Todd a motive other than pure greed: he is a wrongfully imprisoned barber named Benjamin Barker who returns under the name Sweeney Todd to London after 15 years in an Australian penal colony to find that the judge responsible for his imprisonment has raped his young wife and caused her to commit suicide. He swears revenge, but when his plans face obstacles, he begins to slash the throats of his customers. This new element of Todd being motivated by vengeance was Bond's way of grafting dramatic themes from The Revenger's Tragedy onto Pitt's stage plot. * In 1979, Bond's version was adapted by Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler into a hit Broadway musical under the title Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, originally starring Len Cariou as Sweeney Todd and Angela Lansbury as Mrs. Lovett. In 1982, the musical was televised on The Entertainment Channel, starring Lansbury and George Hearn, and directed by Terry Hughes and Harold Prince. * In 1998, Ben Kingsley and Joanna Lumley starred in the John Schlesinger-directed The Tale of Sweeney Todd, a television movie commissioned by British Sky Broadcasting for which Kingsley received a Screen Actors Guild Best Actor nomination. * In 2005, the Broadway Revival Cast made their recording of the show by Sondheim. It was a special redoing of the musical, re-scored specifically for a small orchestra to be played by the actors themselves. The cast consisted of John Arbo (Jonas Fogg; bass player), Donna Lynne Champlin (Pirelli; piano, accordion, flute), Alexander Gemignani (The Beadle; piano, trumpet), Mark Jacoby (Judge Turpin; trumpet, percussion), Diana DiMarzio (Beggar Woman/Lucy Barker; clarinet), Benjamin Magnuson (Anthony Hope; cello, piano), Lauren Molina (Johanna Barker; cello), Manoel Felciano (Tobias; violin, clarinet, piano)), Patti LuPone (Mrs. Lovett; tuba, percussion), and Michael Cerveris (Sweeney Todd; guitar). Cerveris, LuPone, and Felciano were all nominated for Tony Awards; the show itself was nominated at the Tonys for Best Revival and won Best Direction and Best Orchestration. * A BBC television drama version with a screenplay written by Joshua St Johnston and starring Ray Winstone and Essie Davis was broadcast on BBC One on 3 January 2006. * Tim Burton directed a film adaptation of Sondheim's musical starring Johnny Depp as Sweeney Todd, Helena Bonham Carter as Mrs. Lovett, Alan Rickman as Judge Turpin, and Ed Sanders as Tobias. The cast also included Sacha Baron Cohen and Timothy Spall. It opened in US theaters on 21 December 2007 and in the UK on 25 January 2008. The film received two Golden Globe awards - one for Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical (Johnny Depp), and one for Best Picture, Comedy or Musical. The film was also nominated for three Academy Awards, winning for Art Direction. * The new production for America's TV adaptation of the play still has cast selection in progress. Possible historicity In two books,34 Peter Haining argues that Sweeney Todd was a historical figure who committed his crimes around 1800. Nevertheless, other researchers who have tried to verify his citations find nothing in these sources to back Haining's claims.567 There is also a similar story reputed to have occurred on the Rue de la Harpe in Paris that likely influenced the stories of Todd as well.1 Category:Characters